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You know, I'm glad I didn't look at the pictures for this episode once since they were first posted. I totally forgot about Max spazzing out there at the end. I think that was definitely the first time that someone protested about Ash winning a badge completely legitimately (as opposed to Ash's protests about not legitimately winning in "Showdown at Pewter City", "Pokemon Scent-Sation", "A Dairy Tale Ending", and "Watt's with Wattson", and Misty's two separate protests in "The Waterflowers of Cerulean City"). I knew that something had to happen after all the buildup about Ash coming to battle Norman, but Max's reaction was unexpected for me. It certainly made for an interesting dramatic moment.

Great gym battle too. Oh, and I forgot, great line from Jessie and James telling Meowth they don't outsource. Hey, Team Rocket can't be *that* evil.

Pros:
-Overgrow Grovyle
-The unexpected twist of Max running off with the badge
-Many demonstartions of traits. Too bad we really don't see traits in other episodes...

Cons:
-Sorry, TR; You rock and all, but you're almost always useless in Gym Battle episodes.
-We never got to see the Norman-maniac's reaction to his loss.
-Norman's Yami Yugi-ish voice really sounds odd in this ep. I half expected him to say that "It's time to duel!" when the match started. When oh when will the voice actors gain the ability to do more than 5 unique voices?
-Torkoal's quick defeat. Er, I kind of doubt that using a single Flamethrower and Overheat could tire it out THAT much, and a mere Scratch shouldn't damage it anywhere NEAR that much.

Pros:
-Overgrow Grovyle
-The unexpected twist of Max running off with the badge
-Many demonstartions of traits. Too bad we really don't see traits in other episodes...

Cons:
-Sorry, TR; You rock and all, but you're almost always useless in Gym Battle episodes.
-We never got to see the Norman-maniac's reaction to his loss.
-Norman's Yami Yugi-ish voice really sounds odd in this ep. I half expected him to say that "It's time to duel!" when the match started. When oh when will the voice actors gain the ability to do more than 5 unique voices?
-Torkoal's quick defeat. Er, I kind of doubt that using a single Flamethrower and Overheat could tire it out THAT much, and a mere Scratch shouldn't damage it anywhere NEAR that much.

let me think on this.
pros.
1.yeah it was okay until he had to act like a showoff.
2.Kinda saw that coming even without looking at the episode pictures.
3.agreed in full.
Cons.
1.Well duh considering they are building a base.
2.They live on the other side of town, and the battle was not televised so how would they know.
3.who cares about the voice acting, sure caroline now sounds like roxanne, but still nothing new there.
4.Oh god...enough about the loss already, the only reason Slakoth was beating pikachu was because it's matrix defense caught it off gaurd and kept on pelting it with strong attacks,and then Norman made the mistake of continuing blizzard on Torkoal when ash switched it in, that knocking slakoth out and then came vigoroth, now Torkoal at the current time is ash's weakest pokemon in terms of levels, and Vigoroth is a trampler do the the math, and it you want to know why i added the whole pikachu/slakoth matter in here was because of the fact that some people will probably use the excuse of,"But Pikachu is stronger than Torkoal and it had to be recalled against slakoth, how could torkaol beat it and then get knocked out easily form vigoroth."

First off. I disagree with you that Torkoal is Ash's weakest Pokemon in terms of levels. I would have to say that dubious honor belongs to Taillow right now.

Secondly, I don't care how low Torkoal's level is. Pikachu took SEVERAL attacks from both Vigoroth and Slakoth and survived them all. Why don't you compare Pikachu's defense curve with Torkoal's defense curve and get back with me? :/

Besides, we have no idea what level Torkoal was before Ash caught him. From what I saw, you've gotta be at decent level if you wanna survive long in the Valley of Steel.

Torkoal doesn't cry due to weakness, it cries because that's the only way it knows how to express emotion - sadness, happiness, anger, elation over a victory, whatever.

EDIT: Now for my review...

It isn't easy to stretch a gym battle over an entire episode, especially when all the buildup occured in the episode prior to it. But this one did okay. Animation could have been a higher standard, and I miss that awesome music that played under Grovyle's Overgrow ability in Japan, but still pretty good. They really could have explained the abilities better, though - if they introduced Overgrow, what's wrong with Static and Truant?

It took an interesting turn at the end. Much to my surprise, Amy Birnbaum managed to pull off the scene with about the same level of emotion that Yamada Fushigi did. This was a welcome bit of character development for Max - in spite of his smarts, he's still just a little kid who hates to see his dad lose. In fact, that was probably the perfect way to end this episode.

I think Jessie and James could have been omitted from this episode (but God knows that wouldn't happen) without having made much of a difference. Although they did deliver the classic line "Team Rocket is against outsourcing!"

In all, not bad considering it's the first Hoenn gym battle I've seen firsthand.

First off. I disagree with you that Torkoal is Ash's weakest Pokemon in terms of levels. I would have to say that dubious honor belongs to Taillow right now.

Secondly, I don't care how low Torkoal's level is. Pikachu took SEVERAL attacks from both Vigoroth and Slakoth and survived them all. Why don't you compare Pikachu's defense curve with Torkoal's defense curve and get back with me? :/

I think I agree with Yamato-San as to what makes the most sense about Torkoal's quick defeat. It appears to me that based on this and Flannery's Torkoal their bellies are quite weak to attacks, like an achilles heal. It hasn't been mentioned but has been seen in the anime.

1. Flannery's Torkoal suffered little damage when hit by powerful attacks, not flinching to Iron Tail and Thunder. Corphish also had little luck with its attacks at first.
2. However, when Corphish came up and hit Torkoal from the side, and shot Bubblebeam at its belly, it was instantly knocked out. Perhaps the attack from Vigoroth was similar, also noting that Norman's Vigoroth was supposed to be extremely strong (despite apparently knowing only two attacks). ^_^

As for Pikachu, I might be having a memory blank, but didn't it block or dodge most of Vigoroth's physical blows? The main physical hit I recalled Vigoroth actually delivering was when Pikachu let itself get hit to deliver Static. It also may be important to know that attacks you get hit with while trying to dodge them (as Pikachu) probably do a lot less damage than full frontal hits where you have no time to do anything but stand there in shock (as Torkoal, the poor thing had just released Overheat and had no time to switch to defense against that speed demon).

Originally Posted by Bulba the Great!

Anyone notice that in the original, Takeshi talks about Namakero storing up energy with its Truant ability, and then when it evolves to Yarukimono, all the energy is released.

However, in the dub, Brock compliments on Norman's strategy of using the slow Slakoth first, followed by the fast Vigoroth. Any idea why they changed this?

The important thing I think is the lines were illustrating how contrasting the two Pokemon were. To me at least the dub's line about Norman confusing opponents by using Pokemon with vastly different fighting styles made more sense than the one that was supposedly in the Japanese version. I mean, it isn't as though Vigoroth could actually live off the energy stored from Slakoth forever. Energy is finite and it would eventually run out, just like any adult insect that lives for only a few weeks surviving entirely off food stored from its younger stages. The energy from Slakoth probably just helps support its newly active body until it can fully adjust. Of course, this is extreme speculation concerning a speedy sloth that can breath fire. ^_^

yay!Ash gets a Balance Badge!!But i don't likethe fact that Max gets all emotional that his dad lost and locked himself in his dads greenhouse.hey atleast we know Max will eventually become a pokemon trainer.

One of the best episodes to date! Pikachu finally got his rematch against Vigoroth, Torkoal kicked some Slakoth butt and was obiovusly quite happy from it, and Grovyle's fight against Slaking was truely excellent. I like how they purposely knocked out Pikachu after he beat Vigoroth so the battle between Grovyle and Slaking would be even from the start. I also enjoyed that bit at the end where Max was having such a hard time accepting his father's loss, that added a nice bit of character development.

I loved the battle and the use of static and overgrow but what was the point in team rocket in this ep?

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This battle was great but what was replaced with "OK!" was creppy background music, it should've been something more exciting!

Yeah the music sucked, that's certainly something the Kanto and Orange Island gym matche's scored better than over the Hoenn ones.

In any case despite that, this is has been my favourite gym match thus far (dub only) just pipping the post to Flannery's one. I thought it was a very good technical battle, Slakoth did suprisingly well at the beginning, outmatching Pikachu with it's speed attacks. I'm glad it was Grovyle against Slaking at the end, probably the best part, Grovyle was so close to being floored until it gotta the better of Leaf blade versus Focus punch.

I really loved this episode. One of the best Hoenn gym battle episodes I've ever seen so far. I really liked the ending part when Grovyle and Slaking striked simutaneously and then Slaking ended up going down. I actually did a slow motion of this and as I looked closely, I saw Grovyle actually slashing Slaking's ribs (ouch!) And yeah Max crying like a "wittle baby" really got me a bit sick but meh, daddy's boy -_-;;

Was Norman impressed with the win? I know he'd take it in his stride but did he seem impressed with any of Ash's moves?

Meant to ask this question way back when you guys saw it but I forgot.

He was suprised when Torkoal knocked out Slakoth with a single Flamethrower (blasted it right into his arms unconscious), but otherwise was quite confident, cool and collected. He even called Ash's Grovyle's Bullet Seed too weak to arouse Slaking's interest, and later told Ash he should give up the match because Grovyle was too weakenned to stand a chance of winning. Ash sided with Grovyle who beleived he could still win and then Overgrow activated. Till then Grovyle was at quite a disadvantage in everything but speed, Slaking even grabbed it in mid Leaf Blade and tossed it aside like it was nothing.

He was suprised when Torkoal knocked out Slakoth with a single Flamethrower (blasted it right into his arms unconscious), but otherwise was quite confident, cool and collected. He even called Ash's Grovyle's Bullet Seed too weak to arouse Slaking's interest, and later told Ash he should give up the match because Grovyle was too weakenned to stand a chance of winning. Ash sided with Grovyle who beleived he could still win and then Overgrow activated. Till then Grovyle was at quite a disadvantage in everything but speed, Slaking even grabbed it in mid Leaf Blade and tossed it aside like it was nothing.

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